Charles:

Thanks for the message. It sounds as though you regained control of your account, without too much financial damage being done. I am sure that this was not the way you wanted to spend your free time / hobby time, but at least you seem to have prevailed in the end.

So what is the advice for ebay participants to protect their accounts (putting aside the question of how not to get "taken" by people offering items they don't own under IDs they have stolen)?? From your message, the steps would seem to be to (1) never give out / confirm your ebay password and (2) change your ebay password regularly.

Can you or our other readers suggest other steps for the average ebay user??

Thanks,

Jeff

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

: Just a note to let most everyone know why alot
: of eBayers have private auctions. For the
: last month I have been under attack from the
: frauds/crooks/bad guys who steal eBay
: account and email address. On Friday they
: (the bad guys) finally changed my email
: address and eBay account and started listing
: items that I don't have for sale. They also
: changed my email address on the eBay
: auctions. Of course eBay was taking the
: weekend off so I had to fight them single
: handed. I final regained control of my
: account and email address and stopped all
: the fake/fraudulent auctions. This morning I
: finally receive a email from eBay stating
: they had frozen my account. Of course this
: came after I had already won the battle
: against the crooks/frauds/bad guys, so I had
: to start all over again with new passwords.
: Also these individual were able to go into
: my computer and disable the computer so that
: when I went to the eBay site to change my
: passwords it froze up. Ebay informed me that
: whoever is doing this can go into your
: computer with a program that will give them
: your passwork and also disable certain
: program in your computer. Anyway my computer
: was able to correct and purge itself of this
: alien program. You may ask yourself why did
: they pick on me. I have managed to attain
: over 1500 positive feedbacks on eBay with no
: negatives or neturals. I am also a power
: seller. The crooks/bad guys sent out many
: email stating this fact trying to sell the
: Rolexs they had listed on my eBay auction
: site to anyone who made an inquiry or bid.
: After I regained control of my eBay
: identity, email address and auction site, I
: was able to inform anyone who sent email to
: me that it was a fraudulent listing and what
: the crooks/bad guys had done. I have listed
: a couple of watch since this happened and
: these auctions are the type where the
: bidders identity is keep secret. I have done
: this so that they will not receive
: fraudulent emails from the crooks once the
: auction ends. I used to be wary of the
: auctions where the bidder identity was keep
: secret but not anymore. As I stated earlier
: I have been under attack for a month and the
: bad guys were finally able to gain control
: on Friday after Ebay took the weekend off. I
: would suggest that everyone who sells on
: eBay change their password at least once a
: month. I though I would also mention that
: eBay had informed all Power Seller that they
: would have a 24 hours telephone access to
: eBay for any problems. Evidently eBay has
: changed this program because there was only
: a recorded message concerning fraudulent
: takeover of members accounts. This must be a
: major problem with eBay. A word to the wise,
: be careful and don't trust anyone who offers
: to sell outside of eBay unless you know
: them. And then make sure that it is them and
: not someone impersonating them. Charles